Sen. Shadrack McGill explains his explanation, and then finds himself on defensive again

GURLEY - There was an ironic turn to Shadrack McGill's oft-repeated refrain that "I don't believe you can put money over morality."

File photoState Senator Shadrack McGill

I came to ask McGill, the Republican state senator from Woodville, about money.

I ended up sitting through a lecture and debate on morality in the expansive Madison County High School library, where the ambient temperature seemed to rise five degrees every 10 minutes.

Two weeks ago, at a prayer breakfast in Fort Payne, McGill defended the recent raise for state legislators. Here, from the Fort Payne Times-Journal:

"He needs to make enough that he can say no, in regards to temptation. ... Teachers need to make the money that they need to make. There needs to be a balance there. If you double what you're paying education, you know what's going to happen? I've heard the comment many times, 'Well, the quality of education's going to go up.' That's never going to happen, guys.

"It's a Biblical principle. If you double a teacher's pay scale, you'll attract people who aren't called to teach."

He said he was "crucified" for what he said and that he was "sorta sabotaged." It left Lew Gilliland, the talented columnist for the Fort Payne paper, calling for McGill's resignation and labeling him "an embarrassment." The senator has spent much of the last two weeks untwisting that pretzel of a speech.

If not for those words, quite frankly, a couple of newspapers and three TV stations would not have been represented at a "State of the State" meeting on a sleety Monday evening.

He claimed to have been "misquoted." Happily, the senator and I got past the differences of "misquoted" - which he wasn't - and "out of context" - which did happen as his quotes spread through the Internet.

McGill appreciated the opportunity Monday to "clarify" what he said.

The "Biblical principle" of which he spoke wasn't directed toward teacher's pay, he said. It was in regard to a necessary "balance" in those salaries. And that he "would love to get teachers a pay raise, at least a cost-of-living increase."

Clear enough?

McGill, who was elected in November 2010, was quick to admit "I am not a polished politician."

He is a man whose passion and principles seem to be the guiding force of his political path, more than a broad-based knowledge of all issues.

That left him often on the defensive, sometimes defenseless. In his 1 1/2 hours with the three dozen people in the room, you could find yourself cringing for what he said in one instant, cringing for him in another.

The questions went from teacher's pay to road improvements - "the reply we get is the state is broke," McGill said - to tax breaks for the wealthy to charter schools. Then morality issues trumped money issues.

McGill, a staunch anti-abortionist who proclaimed "I think (abortion) is murder," was proud of the state's passage of "The Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act," and said he'll "be passionate to support tougher abortion laws."

Equally passionate were members of the audience more concerned with morality issues than money, more concerned with women's rights and more educated on the issue. It was their facts versus his faith.

After a particularly feisty exchange with one woman, McGill sighed out of frustration, shaking his head, "Lord, Lord. What the world has come to."